"That's absolute rubbish!" "It is not, Magnus. It is not! I don't know why everyone looks down on me, but everyone does." "Well, of course they do!" he said, surprised at her denseness. Her eyes widened. "Of course they look down on me? What do you mean, of course?" He shrugged. "My mother was a Lucilia. So was my grandmother. And what are you?" "That is a very good question. What am I?" He could see she was angry, and it angered him. Women! Here he was with his first big war on his hands, and this creature of no significance was determined to stage her own drama! Did women have no sense at all? "You're my first wife," he said. "First wife?" "A temporary measure." "Oh, I see!" She looked thoughtful. "A temporary measure. The judge's daughter, I suppose you mean." "Well, you've always known that." "But it was a long time ago, I thought it had passed, I thought you loved me. My family is senatorial, I'm not inappropriate." "For an ordinary man, no. But you're not good enough for me.'' "Oh, Magnus, where do you get your conceit from? Is that why you have never once finished yourself inside me? Because I'm not good enough to bear your children?" "Yes!" he shouted, starting to leave the room. She followed him with her little lamp, too angry now to care who heard. "I was good enough to get you off when Cinna was after your money!" "We've already established that," he said, hurrying. "How convenient for you then, that Cinna is dead!" "Convenient for Rome and all good Romans." "You had Cinna murdered!" The words echoed down the stone corridor that was big enough to allow the passage of an army; Pompey stopped. "Cinna died in a drunken brawl with some reluctant recruits." "In Ancona your town, Magnus! Your town! And right after you had been there to see him!" she cried. One moment she was standing in possession of herself, the next she was pinned against the wall with Pompey's hands about her throat.